Watermelon Cupcakes with Angela (recipe included!)

What a great time Angela and I had today making watermelon cupcakes for Facebook live! Did you get to see it? If not, check it out here. These cupcakes are easy to make and, of course, delicious to eat, plus they make everyone ooh and ahh. You’ll definitely want to make them, so here’s the recipe for you! If you do make them and are an LCE member, post a picture of your cupcake creation here — we would love to see them and share them on social media with our friends!

Food you need:

1 box (15.25 ounces) white cake mix
1 cup water
2/3 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 eggs
Red, green, and yellow food coloring
3/4 cup mini chocolate chips (you can also use regular chocolate chips if you have them already)
2 cans (12 ounces each) white frosting

Tools you need:

Paper cupcake liners
Large muffin pan
Big mixing bowls
Measuring cups & spoons
Whisk
Rubber spatula
Ice cream scoop
Hot pads or oven mitts
Toothpick

Let’s make cupcakes!

1) Preheat the oven to 350°F. Put a cupcake liner in each hole in the muffin pan. Set the pan aside. Pour the cake mix into one of the big bowls, then add the water, vegetable oil, vanilla, and eggs. Use the whisk to stir everything together until there are almost no lumps. Squeeze about 20 drops of red food coloring and about 10 drops of yellow food coloring into the cake batter. Stir it in with the whisk until there are no streaks and the batter is watermelon-colored. Now stir in the chocolate chips.

2) Use the ice cream scoop to measure the batter into the lined muffin pan, filling each one about 2/3 full. Make sure each cupcake get some chocolate chips. (You won’t use all the batter in the first batch. Save the leftover batter to make after these cupcakes come out of the oven.) Put the pan into the oven and bake the cupcakes for 15 minutes (set a timer so you don’t forget). When the timer goes off pull the rack out of the oven with the hot pads and use a toothpick to check the cupcakes for doneness – stick the toothpick in a cupcake and if it comes out clean, the cupcakes are done. If there’s gooey batter on the toothpick, bake the cupcakes for 5 more minutes (set the timer again so you don’t forget.)

3) When the cupcakes are done, take them out of the oven with the hot pads and set the pan on a towel or cooling rack on the counter. After 10 minutes, carefully take the cupcakes out of the pan and place them on the counter; put 6 more liners in the pan and fill with the rest of the cupcake batter. Bake these cupcakes just like the first and cool completely (the cupcakes must be totally cool before frosting them. If they’re warm the frosting will melt off the cupcakes.) While the cupcakes cool, use the rubber scraper to scoop the frosting into the other big bowl. Add 20 drops of green food coloring and 10 drops of yellow food coloring, then stir it in with the rubber spatula until the frosting is green and no streaks remain. Frost the cooled cupcakes with the green frosting and sprinkle with more chocolate chips if you’d like.